


Time is the Wisest Counselor

by ratta



Category: The Expanse (TV)
Genre: Eventual Mature Rating, F/F, post-season four, slight AU, sweary
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-12-09
Updated: 2021-02-26
Packaged: 2021-03-09 21:47:06
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 12
Words: 12,615
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27973263
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ratta/pseuds/ratta
Summary: Bobbie accepts Chrisjen’s offer... which leads to something completely different.Set in Luna, picking up where season four left off.
Relationships: Chrisjen Avasarala & Bobbie Draper, Chrisjen Avasarala/Bobbie Draper
Comments: 24
Kudos: 76





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> With so many thanks to @acid_dyes for Chrisjen’s love of singing and hatred of shoes indoors.

_Bobbie, your timing SUCKS._

Chrisjen Avasarala repeated this line to her reflection in the quarter-length mirror of her vanity. She scowled at herself, her first true scowl since landing on Luna, and inspected it, frozen on her face. Had it lost its gravitas, Chrisjen wondered, from disuse? She deepened the expression, pursing her lips just so. There; there it was.

After three months on Luna, Chrisjen had come undone. She thought she’d have hated it, that huge old house with no one but her in it, no job to do, no planet to save. (Planets, she corrected herself, thinking of Draper). But, as loathe as she was to admit it, retirement (though she refused to call it that - refused), suited her. She’d opened all the windows, birds and bugs be damned, to let the good night air in; gotten drunk and listened to Pavarotti at top volume, singing along in great gusts. Chrisjen loved to sing; she couldn’t recall when - or why - she had stopped, only that she had. It wasn’t easy, starting again. Her voice was stiff and uneven, so unlike the rich baritone she took so much pride in. It occurred to her that she had not used her voice for much other than speeches and shouting strings of epithets at her equals and subordinates alike.

Chrisjen dropped the scowl, surveying the rest of her reflection. Her collection of saris, pressed and steamed to attention in their garment bags, remained sealed; Chrisjen had woken up one morning, dressed, and found the fabric unbearable on her skin. Heavy; stiff with embroidery, and itchy. Like a small child, Chrisjen had wriggled off the outfit and left it crumpled in her closet. A thin-strapped silk dress, something she hadn’t worn since god knows when, winked at her from its hanger. It was the most impossible shade of midnight blue, as deep and as bright as a sapphire. It felt amazing. It LOOKED amazing. Inspired, Chrisjen pulled the pins from her hair, tugging apart the tight coils. Long and tousled, it took ten years off her face, she thought. The pins had not been back in it since.

Would Bobbie even recognize her now?

Chrisjen had selected the midnight dress for the arrival of the marine — the former marine, she reminded herself, former marine scavenger - and slipped on a necklace of ruby drops that sat just so at her throat. Wine-colored heels - high, simple. Sexy, she dared herself. Perfect.

The day, however, had been anything but - a comedy of errors, as though the notion of Bobbie’s presence had disquieted the whole of the atmosphere. First, Chrisjen had burnt her tea - burnt! - which she hadnt done since her twenties, and sliced into the pad of her thumb when preparing dessert, dropping the knife, the strawberry, and three drops of blood to the floor with a hissed “MOTHERFUCKER!”

She’d also made the mistake of watching the news feeds - bad, always bad - and caught sight of Nancy Gao’s sour face addressing a crowd - HER crowd, Chrisjen thought bitterly. She glared at her successor; had Gao’s mouth always looked like a puckered little asshole? She supposed it had.

And Arjun. She’d tried to raise him on her terminal, but nothing. Silence. It pained Chrisjen to think of Arjun, but she did anyway, pressing down on the wound on her finger. During her campaign, he’d treated her so lightly, more her aide than her husband, until that last night, when he told her to go to Luna alone. It was the old Arjun she missed, the gentle poet who liked to gaze at the sky with her for hours. Where had he gone? Chrisjen didn’t know.

The sound of chimes gave her a start; the reflection in the vanity flinched (when had she been so jumpy?) but recovered. In moments, she was at the front door, puffing out a little breath before swinging it open.

There, on the step, was the Martian. A bit windswept, weary from travel but apple-cheeked with that quietly earnest smile of hers. “Hello, ma’am,” she said, no sign of fatigue in her voice. It was all Chrisjen could do not to squeeze the impossibly tall woman to her, but instead she smiled warmly and spread her hands wide.

“Welcome to Chrisjen Avasarala’s home for the wayward and exiled,” she said grandly, as Bobbie stepped over the threshold. “Dear god, woman, take those shoes off! Were you raised in a goddamn terrarium?”

Bobbie laughed, then looked down at her boots. “I... don’t think you want to smell my feet just now,” she said, with a grimace.

Chrisjen shot her a look. “I suppose I could hose you off right here,” she said.

“Angling for a wet t-shirt contest, ma’am?”

“Not in my foyer, I’m not. I’d have to put you outside in the cold, which I suppose would have its own -“ she cast a look at Bobbie’s chest - “advantages.”

Bobbie snickered. “Here I was thinking you’d win,” she said slyly.

Chrisjen swatted at her with the sleeve of a nearby jacket, hanging it primly on its hook when it went cockeyed . “No. None of this ridiculousness. You go upstairs to your bathroom and have a shower like a good little Martian. But first, where are your bags?”

Bobbie gestured to the small rolling suitcase and rucksack at her feet.

“That’s all you BROUGHT?”

“That’s all I HAVE,” Bobbie snapped. “Though,” she said, softening her tone, “rumor is I’ve got a bathroom.”


	2. Rumor is, I've Got a Bathroom

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Bobbie enjoys Earther food and her first night on Luna.

_Rumor is, I’ve got a bathroom._

Bobbie Draper squinted at the impossibly small type on the toiletry items in front of her. They were lined up on a ledge in the shower, that huge gray shower that looked like it had been slagged from the earth’s deepest surface, battered and sanded and polished to charcoal perfection. Knowing Avasarala, it likely had been - to her exact measurements and demands.

Bobbie scoffed to herself, a noise that rattled her chest. Dear fuck, she was tired. She’d burnt what little energy she had wandering in and out of the upstairs rooms Avasarala had designated for her - a bedroom, that wanton bathroom, and a small anteroom facing the horizon - a nice touch for her Martian equilibrium. Though Avasarala had obviously streamlined the rooms for Bobbie’s occupation, removing what frippery may have been there in favor of the sturdy and utilitarian, Bobbie could see she had spared no detail. The bedding - blue-gray, befitting of a Martian Marine - was the softest she’d felt, covered with a plush eiderdown and woolen throw. The desk in the anteroom was metal, old, but none of the drawers made so much as a squeak when Bobbie opened them.

And then the maddening little bottles of... what, soap? Bobbie sniffed each one for a clue, but found none except the strong scent of eucalyptus and mint. She squeezed a puddle of the lightest-colored liquid into her hand, then patted it experimentally on her head and rubbed. Instantly, her hair was covered in lather. The jetting water from the shower head seemed to make it worse, sloughing it down the Martian’s forehead and into her eyes.

“Damn it!” Bobbie turned to face the shower head and stood there until the lather was a white foam at her feet. _Feet_ , she thought, _right_ , and bent to give them a vigorous scrubbing with what was left of the soap. On her way out of the bathroom, she contemplated burning her socks.

Luckily, Bobbie had made enough cash from The Gig (that’s what she called it, shuddering as she recalled just how close she got to being blown to bits - _stupid fucking crooked-ass cops_ ) to acquire some civilian clothes. Not too many, though; most of that money was in a clip at the bottom of one of her unused dress shoes, deep in her suitcase. The clothes were good quality, sturdy, a mix of hardy twill and a few professional blazers. T-shirts that should last her a lifetime, and some good, shitkicking brogues. Plus her old Marine-issue boots, the only remnant of her uniform that she'd kept.

As she slipped on fresh socks, sans shoes, Bobbie wondered if her look was boring. To add a bit of color, she dug in her rucksack pocket and produced a small silver band. On the inside were the coordinates for the Rocinante when she’d first boarded, holding Avasarala and her fizzling brain aloft. On the other side, the circles of the MCR flag.

When Bobbie arrived downstairs, she found Avasarala at the table, sitting in front of a set table, laden with food. She was absorbed with whatever was on her terminal, grunting as she browsed through with a swipe of her delicate hand.

“Did you invite an army to dinner, ma’am?” Bobbie asked, hoping to catch Avasarala off guard.

No such luck. The older woman raised her head gracefully. “No, just a soldier,” she replied. “Come, sit.”

Bobbie held her tongue - _former soldier_ , _former_ , she longed to say, but did not. Instead, she sat.

“We have lamb on this side, roast chicken on this side, and some hummus and pita. Then a Greek salad, sag aloo, and rice pilaf. For dessert —“ here Avasarala said something in a language Bobbie’s brain could not replicate. “I didn’t know what you’d like, so I figured why not get creative in the kitchen?”

“You MADE this?” Bobbie stared at the impossible array of food. The fact of it was mind-boggling enough, but that the Undersecretary - _ex_ - _Undersecretary_ \- had so much as looked at a stove surprised her.

“I most certainly did," Avasarala said, narrowing her eyes ever so slightly at Bobbie. "And if you don’t eat, I’ll be terribly insulted.”

“Where should I begin?”

Avasarala uncovered a steaming plate. “I figured you’d ask that,” she said, holding it out to Bobbie. “Start with these.”

****

The meal was a blur of sensory overload. Bobbie had never tasted anything like it, nothing as rich and as real as the Earther food in front of her. She watched Avasarala watch her with increasing amusement as Bobbie gorged herself as politely as she could.

“Easy there, ducky,” Avasarala said, covering Bobbie’s hand with her own as she reached for another helping of... oh, hell, she couldn’t remember what. “Let your system adjust.”

“Fine.” Bobbie let out a sigh. _Ducky_ , she thought, _is that a pet name? Some silly Earther thing?_ She stifled a small belch, and reclined as much as she could in her seat.

“Now is when you thank me,” said Avasarala. Her eyes glittered in the light.

“Thank you,” Bobbie said heartily. “I think I have now eaten so much that I might die.”

“Well, don’t do it in my dining room.”

“I’ll take that into account, ma’am.” She let her eyes roam the house, from the dark wooden ceiling to the posh kitchen appliances to the big bay windows. “So,” she said. “What’s this whole work scheme you’ve got planned?”

Avasarala groaned indelicately. “Not tonight, for fuck’s sake, Draper. You just got here and it’s about to be the dead of night.”

“Okay, then; what's this whole 'dead of night' scheme you've got planned? Tell ghost stories? Braid each other's hair?”

“No. Don’t be a fool. We go to bed.”

“Go to BED?” Bobbie turned up an eyebrow. “Ma’am...” she let her voice creep up, stress on the first syllable, raising an eyebrow to match.

With the grace of a fencer, Avasarala plucked a dinner roll from its basket and, with surprising accuracy, hurled it at her companion. “I was talking about SLEEP, Draper,” she growled.

Bobbie hid a smile as she retrieved the roll from where it had landed, just to the right of her empty plate. With a stoic Marine stare, she stuffed the entirety of the roll in her mouth, watching with delight as Avasarala wrestled with her expression.

“Guh’hite, b’aab,” Bobbie said, with a snappy salute.

Avasarala rewarded her with an exaggerated snort of exasperation. “Good night, you ridiculous girl,” she replied.


	3. Good Night, You Ridiculous Girl

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Chrisjen and Bobbie share breakfast. Bobbie demands answers. Chrisjen gives them. Sort of.

_Good night, you ridiculous girl._  
  
For all her want of sleep, Chrisjen was unable to get any. Most nights she would stayed up until fatigue finally hit, which was more often than not just before sunrise. Chrisjen blamed it on the change in climate, in time zone, in fucking planetary system. On Earth, she'd been up at dawn.  
  
Now Chrisjen was in her home office downstairs, light years away from New York and her former life, curled into an armchair with her terminal in hand. She preferred it that way, the small screen rather than the larger projection. Updates blinked up at her, but she ignored them. The news was grim, grim, grim, and Chrisjen was too far away to be of any use, even if she had retained her title - which she had not. Plus, her mind needed to be clear. She had a Martian to brief in the morning.  
  
_A Martian in the morning_. It almost sounded poetic, and maybe it was. Truthfully, Chrisjen hadn't much time for poetry; one could not read the greats and stop interplanetary war at the same time. Not the way that Chrisjen was able to finalize her tactical maneuvers to Maria Callas, or Amalia Rodriguez, or, when she was feeling particularly stuck, ancient British punk.

(Only one person knew about Chrisjen's affinity for 20th century rock and roll subculture - _oh, Cotyar_ \- and he was dead. A lonely feeling.)  
  
Chrisjen awoke with the sun on her face and a familiar ache in her neck. She slid out of the armchair with a groan, rolling her shoulders. Fuck, it hurt.  
  
"Don't tell me you slept in those clothes."  
  
The giant Martian was leaning in the doorway, as though she were holding it up - as though she'd always been there, just like that. For all her Marine stiffness, Bobbie seemed able to be effortlessly comfortable anywhere, without the need for careful pleasantries. Chrisjen may have cursed like a heathen, but her good etiquette ran deep. Bobbie made do with a blank, alert stare, square shoulders, and hands clasped behind her back. The rest of the time she slouched and grunted and snarked as she pleased, where she pleased, swaggering that big body around. Formality be damned. It alternately tickled Chrisjen and drove her nuts.  
  
"Hmm," Chrisjen said primly. She stifled a yawn. "I don't suppose you made coffee?"  
  
"Already brewing, ma'am. And there's breakfast. Sort of."  
  
Chrisjen followed Bobbie into the dinette, where the Martian had laid out a puzzling mix; Chrisjen spotted raisins, leftover rice pilaf, salami on a plate, a jar of pickled cabbage with a spoon in it, and two untouched persimmons before she burst into laughter.  
  
" _You_ ," was all she said, allowing the word an affectionate warmth. Then: "A valiant effort. I commend you."   
  
Of the food, Chrisjen opted for salami. Meat in the morning was a good idea, she had to give Bobbie that; protein. Chrisjen put slices of sourdough bread to two plates, a dish of butter on the table, and a napkin in front of Bobbie, who had inexplicably started with the pickled cabbage. It was heaped on her plate like a small mountain.  
  
"This is delicious," Bobbie said, around a mouthful. "It's the weirdest color, but it's amazing." She dropped a handful of raisins into the mountain, either not noticing or not caring to notice Chrisjen's disgusted expression. "Even better," she declared, after another huge bite.  
  
Chrisjen wondered if the silly girl really meant it or was just trying to get a rise out of her, but Bobbie seemed genuinely happy, licking a stray bit of cabbage juice from her thumb.  
  
"I will never understand the Martian palate," Chrisjen said, sliding into the seat opposite Bobbie. "You reject red kippers, or whatever it was that Belter girl fed us, yet you will happily eat..." she gestured to Bobbie's plate. "... That."  
  
Bobbie shrugged. "It's good," she said. "Better than good."  
  
"Well, enjoy it."  
  
"Thank you. I will."  
  
Chrisjen liked to linger over breakfast; she always had. A bit more coffee, topped off with cream, stirred lazily with what had been her father's favorite spoon. Another slice of bread, this time with jam, as she scrolled through the arts and leisure news.  
  
Bobbie, on the other hand, seemed to view the meal as nothing more than pesky obligation. A fueling of the body. She was jittery, pensive, jawing her leg up and down like a rapid hydraulic, while her eyes roamed an unseen distance.  
  
"For fuck's sake, Draper. That gargantuan knee of yours keeps hitting the table. It's like a fucking earthquake."  
  
"Sorry, ma'am." Bobbie ran a hand through her hair. "Just... when are we going to discuss this... whatever it is you've cooked up? I have no idea what you've got planned. Are you launching a handmade soap business? A retirement community for war criminals? An armored lingerie line? It better not be the soap, because I couldn't for the life of me figure out which of those thousand bottles in the shower up there was safe to wash my ass with. Coulda been toothpaste, for all I know."  
  
Chrisjen glared at her from over her terminal. "Have you no patience at all?" she asked.  
  
"None. I thought that was clear."  
  
The terminal clinked when Chrisjen set it down on the table. She had been careful to avoid the vicinity of the cabbage. Bobbie was apparently terrible at serving herself, and had scattered so many little mounds of purple across Chrisjen's tablecloth that it now looked like a topographical map.  
  
"Fine," Chrisjen said. "But interrupt my breakfast again and there will be consequences."  
  
"Sexy."  
  
Chrisjen ignored this. "As I'm sure you know, the most valuable commodity, regardless of planetary interest, isn't a weapon, a biological resource, or some new godforsaken piece of technology: it's information."  
  
When Bobbie said nothing, her bright brown gaze centered in concentration, Chrisjen continued: "As much of an old snake as I may be, I still have supporters in high places, prominent people who, whether they like me personally or not, have allowed me to gain their trust." She paused for effect. Draper's expression - _damn her_ \- remained impassive. Drama was lost on soldiers. "Effectively, I have eyes and ears everywhere, in areas no one else does."  
  
"Okay," Bobbie said. "I mean, that's very nice, ma'am, that you have a cute little knitting circle or whatever, but I've just been on two ships, security checked at three docking stations, and shifted gravity fields with a full bladder for five hours. What the fuck am I doing here?"


	4. What the Fuck Am I Doing Here?

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Avasarala offers Bobbie the opportunity of a lifetime. Bobbie is... emotional.

_ What the fuck am I doing here? _

Waiting for a response, Bobbie fished a tiny sliver of cabbage off her plate with her fork - she couldn’t help it, she really couldn’t, it was though she had tasted something she’d been looking for her entire life without knowing it.

“Are you quite finished?” Avasarala said.

“Speaking, or with this purple stuff? Because, in that order, yes, and  _ never _ .”

“Wonderful. Now,  _ do  _ be quiet, because there is a lot for me to get through and I’ll never get it done if you insist on interrupting.”

“Aye-aye, ma’am,” Bobbie said.

But she held her tongue as Avasarala, in her typical wordy way, explained what she had been thinking. “We are once again in the age of  _ information _ , Bobbie. It is the currency of the new Sol. And though our alliances are still new, still fresh and fragile, now is the time to forge their strength.”

_ Would she ever get to the god damned point _ , Bobbie wondered. It was making her positively itchy to have to sit and listen to the old woman opine about all the promise of new planetary unity, because, well, she was tired. She’d had odd dreams and woken up sweaty and confused in a bedroom that was too big after years in a barracks, months on her brother’s couch, and those weeks in the sleek but utterly hideous hotel.

“What if,” Avasarala was saying, “what if  _ we  _ were the ones to open these doors? If  _ we _ \- the best of the Belt, Mars, and Earth - were the first nongovernmental interplanetary consortium devoted to the validation, evaluation, and dissemination of--”

“Brokers.” Bobbie could no longer stand it. “We’d be brokers. But we’d deal in intelligence.”

Avasarala pursed her lips. “Not what I would call it, but yes,” she said. “And we would be wholly nonpartisan.”

“Hired guns,” said Bobbie. “I mean, metaphorically. Though I’m assuming that, if I’m here, there will also be some… actual guns…”

“Draper.”

“Sorry, sorry. I’ll be serious, I promise. I like the idea, ma’am. Not… entirely ethical, probably, because god knows who’d we be contracting with, but… If we’re going to serve the entire Sol, it’s a chance we’ll have to take.”

“I was hoping you’d say that,” Avasarala said. “Because I’d like you to sign on, Bobbie. As Chief Operations Officer.”

Bobbie blinked for what felt like an entire minute. “I…”

“Say yes.”

_ That voice.  _ “I don’t even know what a Chief Operations Officer  _ is _ ,” Bobbie said. She felt her face grow hot with near panic. “I was a gunnery sergeant. I know how to neutralize a threat. I can shoot through the center of a coffee cup from two klicks away. I’ve had more blood sprayed on me than exists in your entire body. I’m trained for war, Chrisjen. Not playing tea party at a desk or whatever it is you’re suggesting.”

Across from Bobbie, Avasarala looked infuriatingly calm, her hands clasped in front of her, that tiny smile on her face. “You’re not a machine, Bobbie. What I need you to do is exactly what you do best. Develop tactics. Analyze situations quickly, threat or otherwise. Train a team. Calculate risk. Evaluate who can be trusted, who can be useful, and who should be avoided.”

Bobbie glanced down at her plate. Tiny spirals of cabbage formed a wonky fractal by her fork. What Avasarala said made sense, and at the same time didn’t. For so long, Bobbie had been, as some of her fellow soldiers called her, The Martian Tank, more at home in her power armor than her own human skin. All her senses on high alert, estimating how fast she could get from point A to point B and where she could land if one of those were suddenly compromised.  _ That  _ is what she’d done best, or at least so she’d thought. But the idea of going back, as impossible as it was, to constant death and adrenaline and physical pain - and in pursuit of  _ what? -  _ pushed Bobbie toward such despair that it scared her.

“Tell me what you are thinking.” Avasarala was peering at her, head cocked to one side like a bird.

“I…” Bobbie couldn’t find the words. Her eyes darted all around the table, not registering anything in front of her. It was so much all at once.

A tiny warm hand closed over her large one. “Bobbie, look at me.”

Bobbie took a deep breath, then met Avasarala’s gaze. She swallowed against a stab of… Not quite fear. _ Oh fuck. _

“They didn’t deserve you,” Avasarala continued, her voice just above a whisper. “I don’t know if I do, either. This is going to be very different from what you’re used to in some ways, but in others… Well, I think you’ll surprise yourself.” A pause. “Do you want to do this, Bobbie? Because, really, that’s what matters.” She slid her thumb under Bobbie’s, squeezing lightly.

_ That hand. _ Six rings on five fingers, Bobbie noted uselessly. Four with small stones, two with large. Suddenly and inexplicably, former Gunnery Sergeant Roberta Draper found herself near tears.

She swallowed them away. “More than anything,” she said, voice hoarse. “More than  _ anything _ .”


	5. Chapter 5

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A quiet dinner to commemorate the Avasarala-Draper alliance.

_ More than anything. _

Chrisjen had known, but Bobbie said it anyway. It was almost painful for Chrisjen, watching the young Martian wrestle with her emotions, how tangled up she was. The poor kid had just given up everything she’d ever known to live in the cold craigs of Luna; that and all the horrible situations Bobbie had faced as a soldier, a marked deserter, and then a hero who couldn’t save her beloved Marine Corps - or Mars - from the inside, from itself.

After the breakfast briefing, Chrisjen gave Bobbie a wide berth, allowing her time to process. Even out of sight, Bobbie was a big presence. Chrisjen could feel her footfalls through the ceiling as Bobbie either paced or stretched or ran through the sets of pushups she did when she needed to focus. 

By dinnertime, though, Bobbie was all business. Chrisjen was warming baked potatoes in the microwave -  _ had Bobbie ever eaten a real potato, from the ground _ \- when the Martian appeared at the kitchen island, terminal in hand.

“So,” she said, without so much as a preamble (Chrisjen loved this bluntness; it was helpful). “In order to get this thing up and running, we’re going to need…” she glanced down at her terminal… “A lot.”

“Oh?” Chrisjen slid the potatoes into a bowl, watching Bobbie’s glance deviate, the slight flicker of her nostrils - an animal locating food. The girl was fascinating.

“Yeah.” Bobbie moved toward Chrisjen’s side of the kitchen island. “If we’re gonna be housing serious dirt on serious people, we’re gonna need  _ security.  _ For comms  _ and  _ for storage. High encryption. All that. It’s not gonna be cheap.”

_ Fuck _ . As glad as Chrisjen was to see Bobbie embracing her new role, she hadn’t bargained on it happening over dinner. And she’d hashed out so many plans, some easy, some contentious, over meals that she was well and fully sick of it. 

“I figured it wouldn’t be,” she said smoothly. “You can tell me all about it if you cut these carrots into sixths.”

Without complaint, Bobbie discarded her terminal for a cutting board. For as weird as her eating habits were, she wasn’t bad with a knife. Chrisjen smiled to herself. Give the girl a weapon and she turned into the picture of grace.

Chrisjen allowed Bobbie to chatter on, and, mercifully, Bobbie allowed Chrisjen to nudge her all around the kitchen and through the various tasks of assembling the meal. By the time they sat down to eat, Bobbie had laid out most of her ideas - a dizzying list of vendors to consider; plans for a Lunar office suite; a guy she knew who had developed his own proprietary, impossible to hack tightbeam relay system. 

“You’ve hardly left anything for me to do,” Chrisjen said, pride in her voice.

“That’s the idea,” Bobbie said. “You just sit there and look pretty.”

Chrisjen lowered her eyelids a moment, smirking across the table at Bobbie. “At least it won’t go to waste,” she purred. 

But Bobbie was busy investigating a bell pepper. “You make a very fine figurehead, ma’am,” she said.

For the occasion of their first business meeting, Chrisjen had added a bottle of white wine to the meal, which she brought to the table in a champagne bucket given to her ages ago by a particularly besotted European ombudsman.  _ What had his name been?  _

“Does all your booze come in its own tin?” Bobbie asked.

“It’s not a tin. It’s the proper vessel for serving a beverage of ceremony.”

Bobbie took the glass of wine she was offered. “Oh-ho!” she said sarcastically. “I see.”

“Be nice, or you won’t get a second glass. And believe me, you’ll want one.”

Chrisjen delighted in witnessing Bobbie’s first taste. The Martian’s eyes widened in surprise, then closed. Her expression rearranged itself into one of pure, placid enjoyment. 

“That’s… really good,” she said.

“See, now, sometimes listening to me is to your benefit,” said Chrisjen.

The two sipped their wine in companionable silence, until Bobbie asked, “is it safe to go for a run out there or will I get eaten by wolves or something?”

“Don’t be ridiculous. There were never wolves on Luna.”

“How the hell should I know? I don’t know anything about wolves, ma’am. I’ve never even seen a dog.”

Chrisjen put her glass down with an inelegant clonk. “You’ve never seen a  _ dog?” _

“I mean, I’ve  _ seen  _ a dog,” Bobbie said, taking a hurried drink of her wine. “But just on broadcasts. Not like an actual  _ dog _ dog.”

_ What a wonder, this Martian. _ “Well, I can assure you: no wolves. You can run to your little heart’s content. Though why you’d want to, god only fucking knows.”

“I like running,” Bobbie said simply. 

“And I,” Chrisjen said, rising from her seat dramatically, “like opera after dinner.”

“Is  _ that _ what that obnoxious wailing was last night?” Bobbie asked. “And here I thought your stereo stream had gotten scrambled. Either that or an unfortunate orgy.”

“Angels weep.” Chrisjen put a hand to her chest and huffed. “ _ That  _ was  Carmen .”

“Well, she should keep her day job.”

Chrisjen narrowed her eyes. The Martian gave an impudent little tilt of her chin.

“You’d better start running,” Chrisjen said, letting out the full, low timbre of her voice. “Or else I might catch you.” 


	6. Or Else I Might Catch You

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Bobbie goes for a run and staves off a crisis of identity.

Or else I might catch you.

Bobbie grinned to herself as she ran through Luna’s dark craters. It was strange, to be outside, though she knew that she wasn’t, not fully. Luna was built further under the ground than Mars, but its colonists had been wealthier, hardier, and thoroughly invested in recreating the beauty they so missed on Earth. Martians had long called it hedonistic, wasteful, but, looking out into the vast space, Bobbie could see the appeal. The caverns were huge, blasted out of the Lunar surface, then carved here and there into winding stairs and grottos. The rest was gray desert, bare and eerily beautiful.

The Avasarala compound was surrounded by thick knots of rock and scrubby grass, a kind of gleaming gravel that led up and over to a longer tract of land.The geography of it still made Bobbie dizzy, though far less so than Earth’s. And, oh, there were trees. Not in pots, or some kind of over-cultivated garden dome, but actual honest-to-god versions of the things, right out in front of her. The gleaming gravel (limestone, Avasarala had said; imported) crunched under Bobbie’s feet as she ran past, and she slowed to trail her palm across the bark. She’d seen the ocean, and now she’d felt a tree.

Running soothed Bobbie. If she moved her body at the same speed as her thoughts, her anxiety slowed, giving way to a renewed focus. The past few weeks had been… Bobbie didn’t know what they had been. Terrifying, exhilarating. Horrible, wonderful. She pushed into the feeling, all of them, whichever of them, and willed her feet faster.

If this was going to work, Bobbie knew she’d need more than a Lunar hideout and the good word of an oft-hated, aging, foul-mouthed politician - one who’d just been made redundant, no less. Bobbie herself was twice-disgraced - possibly thrice, since she’d now also taken a turn as a thief. What possible use was she going to be as… as whatever that ridiculous title was that Avasarala had come up with? Her best in was as a former (dishonorable; dishonorable) marine, but Bobbie’s remaining contacts in the MCRN were very few, likely dwindling by the day. The only way around it would be something vaguely crazy, like a new set of documents and an update to her implant.

Who would she be, then? Bobbie tried to imagine an alternate identity as she ran past a rough-hewn little plaza, but came up empty. She had always been what she supposed she was now: big, strong, quick, protective. Hot-headed, stubborn. Made for heavy lifting, fights…

But was that her anymore?

Bobbie stopped to lean against a boulder, breathing hard into her closed fist. She swigged from her canteen flask, careful not to overdo it, then broke into a slow cool down. She’d had enough of a think for the day.

The lights of the house were visible in front of her, down incline that looked longer than it had felt. It wound down into a fork, one going toward the Avasaralas and the other into a quick switchback, like the ones in the dunes that had Bobbie whipped through as a teenager, shouting her head off. But instead of leading to dust-covered buggies, the little road dead-ended at a small, barn-like building just a few klicks south of the compound.

Bobbie veered off course, approaching the barn with caution. A quick scan with her handheld told her that she was still well within the Avasarala property line, but there was no data on the building available, just its name: WORKSHOP.

“Workshop,” Bobbie muttered. A keypad stood guard outside, unlit and foreboding. No motion sensor lights came on, so Bobbie stood, alone, in the dark, contemplating. With a shiver, she turned back, heading for the compound.

The house was bursting with warm light, a bit of a sensory shock after Luna’s cool dimness. Bobbie could hear Avasarala’s wailing music before she entered, grimacing, to find the former Secretary General waltzing about the living room with a broomstick.

“Partying hard with the cleaning supplies, I see,” Bobbie said, fully expecting Avasarala to startle in embarrassment. Instead, the small woman cradled her broom into a low dip. “Inanimate objects make the best dance partners,” she said, never missing a beat. “They never ever step on your toes.”


	7. They Never Ever Step on Your Toes

They never ever step on your toes.

Over the next week, Chrisjen thought of dancing. Of the push-pull partner work, the fluidity, the anticipation of steps in time with another.

Chrisjen was a graceful dancer, but a studied one. She could lead, she could follow, she could fly around the floor with the best of them, but she never lost awareness, never floated like she suspected a real natural would.

Bobbie, on the other hand… Chrisjen glanced at the young woman across the table, so absorbed in her hand terminal that she’d left her fork raised with her next bite of waffle. Though heavy-footed, loud, and large, Bobbie had that innate something Chrisjen lacked. Sure, she slouched in her seat, shoulders rounded near her ears, causal posture more suited to a gorilla than a person… and yet. She moved around Chrisjen so easily most of the time, picking up on even her smallest routines - which drawers Chrisjen left half open; how she always propped herself in the same spot to take off her coat. It must have been something in her soldier’s brain that made Bobbie effortlessly aware of space and proximity, Chrisjen thought, always calculating.

Or maybe it was just her.

“More coffee?”

The Martian was behind Chrisjen now, which startled her. Bobbie must have gotten up without her noticing. It was far too late in the day for to be so absentminded, Chrisjen chastised herself, lifting her cup to Bobbie in answer.

“I better get a tip,” Bobbie said, as she replaced the carafe in its unit. “And I don’t deal in, uh, political favors.” She sat back down, legs spread indelicately as she often did.

Chrisjen fixed her with a saucy smile, dipping her eyes toward Bobbie’s midsection. “Would you like me to crawl in your lap, then? Is that what you’re telling me?”

Bobbie rolled her eyes, but a hair too late; Chrisjen had caught the small jolt of shock she was counting on.

“Maybe it’s a good idea,” Bobbie said, pulling the sleeves of her sweatshirt up over her hands. “It’s fucking freezing on this god damned planet.”

“I can turn the heat up. Far less risky than inciting a Martian.”

Bobbie shrugged, back to casual, neutral. Chrisjen hated how she could do that without even trying. There was nothing measured about Bobbie at ease.

“Oh,” Bobbie said. “I forgot to ask - what’s the workshop?”

“The what? The—“ Chrisjen stopped short when she realized. Fuck. Fuck!

Oblivious, Bobbie continued: “that outbuilding on the trail. It’s just called Workshop.”

“Ah.” Chrisjen kept her voice light. God, why hadn’t she changed its name on the property maps? Why hadn’t she turned it into a fucking gym, or a playhouse for her grandchildren, or whatever it is a parent is supposed to do with the last intact artifact of their dead son? Why hadn’t she just blown the building to bits? It would have been as easy as smashing a statue.

(Because Chrisjen hadn’t counted on having this huge hulking Martian with her big brown eyes lolloping all over her estate like a goddamn mountain goat, that’s why)

It was those eyes - Chrisjen could feel them searching her face - that brought her back. “Ugh,” she said, with a grimace. “Fucking disaster area.”

“Is it?”

Bobbie had that look - good CHRIST.

“No, Draper,” Chrisjen said, raising a finger in warning; Bobbie’s gaze followed it. “Do not get any ideas. Stay out of there. I’m serious.”

“Fine, fine. Just trying to… operate over here. Chiefly.”

“You can be as chiefly as you like. Just for fuck’s sake keep it to... limited environs.”

“Limited environs, got it.” Bobbie’s nose was back in her hand terminal, and Chrisjen swallowed down an impulse to scream. She stared down the part in Bobbie’s glossy hair, wondering idly if she’d selected the right shampoo for… what, her employee? Her… coworker?

Her Martian.

Chrisjen rose from her seat for more coffee, if only so she could consider this thought in private. The words had jumped at her, delicate in their possessiveness of the seemingly indomitable force seated at the kitchen table… having waffles topped with raisins, strawberries, mango chutney, and a fried egg. 

Her Martian. 

This goofy girl who was a thousand times smarter than she realized, who could fall into perfect step with a woman half her size and twice her age with the same frightening ease as she wielded a gun. Bobbie was a lesson in incongruencies, Chrisjen thought; she belched like a teenage boy and ate like an ape, yet possessed a striking sort of raw beauty.

“Hello? Chrisjen?”

Again, behind her.

Chrisjen summoned herself a put-upon look, then. “Yes, Bobbie?”

Bobbie had her chin propped on her elbows. Adorable.

“Are we done with this breakfast nonsense yet?” She asked. Can we… I don’t know, actually get shit done now?”


	9. Can We Actually Get Shit Done Now?

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Bobbie disobeys. Disaster strikes.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I hated doing this to these two, but it will draw them closer together in the end! Needed a bit of tension that wasn't of the sexual variety. But do not fear for our two heroines!

_ Can we actually get shit done now? _

Based on the amount of notifications on her terminal, Bobbie was beginning to regret her words. Avasarala, for as much as she liked long, dawdling meals, seemed to squeeze far more productivity into the day than Bobbie had previously thought possible.

“Put the documents on the holo,” Avasarala instructed her. They had decamped to Avasarala’s study, Avasarala at her massive desk, Bobbie folded up into the armchair. Not exactly professional, but it worked. 

Avasarala was all business. “Start with the military applications,” she said.

News of the intelligence brokerage - or whatever the fuck their sector was actually called these days (Bobbie didn’t know much about the semi-legitimate arms of the industry, only the 100% up-and-up and the downright nefarious) - had spread. Would-be contractors were sending in resumes from across the Sol, many of them ex-military. Many of them Martian.

“Yes, ma’am.” Bobbie activated the holo, aiming it for the space between them. “Ennis Romano-Erickson. 18 years MCRN; Infantry E1 —“

A gripe from the desk: “Can we fucking hurry this up? Do we consider him or not?”

Bobbie rolled her eyes. “Fine.” She flipped past the man’s resume and to his DD-214s, scanning silently until - “ooof.”

Avasarala snapped to attention. “What?” She asked. “What did you find?”

Grimacing, Bobbie said, “this one is  _ definitely _ an OHN.”

“Speak fucking English, Draper. I know you know how.”

“See this little mark by the signature?” Bobbie pointed to what looked like a jagged line at the end of the commanding officer’s authorization. “It’s a shorthand, kind of - they call it an Oh Hell No - OHN. This guy got an honorable, right, but there was a proceeding against him that’s omitted from the file by default - it didn’t go to internal trial, but it was bad enough that the CO wanted to flag it on the 214. This one has two ticks and a slash; that’s a 2.2.20 violation. Sexual assault. So, we reject.”

“Jesus Christ,” Avasarala said, her voice at its lowest register. Bobbie shivered involuntarily. “How brilliantly twisted militaries are. Almost like governing bodies.”

Bobbie said nothing. Despite all that had happened, she found it hard to ding the marine corps aloud, especially with Avasarala. Bobbie couldn’t give the old Earther quite that kind of deference; she’d relinquished far too much already.

The two went through the applications like this - Bobbie decoding, Avasarala remarking - until Avasarala deemed it lunchtime (“a  _ working _ lunch,” she said, to Bobbie’s scowl). They took their food to Avasarala’s study on trays, Bobbie balancing hers on her knees as they continued on.

It was getting dark when Bobbie dug her fingers into her brows, wondering just how long Avasarala could go. Indefinitely, she suspected. Possibly until—

“Am I losing you, there, Bobbie?”

Avasarala’s accompanying look was not unkind, so Bobbie nodded. “A little,” she said. “My eyes are burning. I need a run or something. Gotta get my yayas out.”

“Beg pardon?” Avasarala let her terminal rest on her desk.

_ Good.  _ Bobbie unfolded herself from the armchair and did a little jump-step in demonstration, letting her arms flop around at will. “Yayas. Energy, basically, like after doing this -“ she indicated the holo - “all day. It was something my Nan said when us kids got too restless. She’d toss us into the yard and make us do laps around the house - she called it getting our yayas out.”

“How perfectly ridiculous.” Avasarala paused. “I love it. I might steal it.”

“Nan won’t mind,” Bobbie said.

“Well, off you go, then,” Avasarala said, closing the holo with a flick of her wrist. “Go do whatever tortuous activity your little heart desires. Tend to your excessive yayas. Civilized life will be here when you return.”

Bobbie took her usual route through the rocks. She could tell them apart now, recognize which ones had been cut or drilled or shaped and which had been left to their own devices. There were some that glinted in the light from Earth, far in the distance, and Bobbie had stopped to examine the tiny crystal points.  _ Like magic _ .

On her way back, sweat trickling from her hairline into her ears, Bobbie stopped once more outside the silent workshop. No matter how she tried, Bobbie could not get over what a waste it was to just let it sit there, an entire outbuilding abandoned.  _ Just like fucking Earthers.  _ To dismiss value so blatantly while everyone else made do with scraps. 

The workshop’s lone window faced the direction of Earth. Bobbie peered into it; her own reflection peered back.  _ Right, then _ . A few swipes on her terminal and Bobbie had a scope up on the discreet holo that hovered in front of her. 

Whatever mess lay inside the workshop, Bobbie was not intimidated. She and her brother had dismantled their nan’s house in a single week, and Nan hadn’t the spare, rational aesthetic of the Avasaralas. 

“Show me what’s inside,” Bobbie muttered at the holo, aiming its sight points with her fingers. 

To Bobbie’s surprise, the interior was neat as a pin. Rows upon rows of what she knew were tools by their shape and position; a long bank of workbenches; a desk facing a wall of LEDs. Bobbie slid the sight points carefully, taking them around a bend, and -- paint. Buckets of paint. 

_ Or, not paint?  _

Bobbie paused. The buckets were the right size for paint, but the shape was wrong - wrong and  _ familiar. _ She flicked the sight points -- blurry.  _ Dammit. _ Where had she seen them before?

_ Come on, memory _ . It wasn’t like her to forget, but after…  _ everything, _ Bobbie’s brain had changed. Flashbacks. Dreams that jolted her out of sleep with a yell or a gasp. Sleeplessness. Restlessness. Infinitely more aches when the weather turned. And the dodgy recall.

Shaking her head, Bobbie flicked the holo away, starting the last leg of her run at a slow jog. She’d get a shower, stretch out, find something to eat, and --

_ Stealth tech. _

Bobbie stopped in her tracks. 

_ Martian stealth tech _ . 

She closed her eyes, pulling the memory back. Those buckets, black with the white label, the squared-off tops -- she’d seen them in trainings, or in presentation photos, and (empty) on the field crew captain’s desk as a pencil holder ( _ show-offy bastard, _ Bobbie thought at the time). 

Was she crazy, or was she right?

Back at the workshop’s entry pad, Bobbie’s heart pounded. She was going in only a little less than blind, but she had to know. There was no other option. If Avasarala was knowingly in possession of a cache of ill-gotten Martian technology, they were going to have a problem. If she was  _ unwittingly  _ in possession of a cache of ill-gotten Martian technology, then… that was a different story.

The digital lockpick app David had sent her, the one Bobbie had scoffed at (“‘L0kpikr,’ that’s cute”) made easy work of the entry code (and, with a twinge of guilt, Bobbie tapped the “suppress alarm” option). The door clicked open softly, and Bobbie slipped behind it.

Inside, the workshop was bigger than she’d imagined. The main floor was a huge, open space, with stairs leading up to a lofted second floor. Bobbie’s flashlight swept across stacked storage shelves, a rack with three outdated hoverboards, and enough tools to satisfy a gang of engineers.

_ Fuck, don’t be a squirrel. Stealth tech _ .

What the scope had caught was in six hulking gray tactical boxes - boring, anonymous, until the scope’s sensors revealed what was inside them. Breathlessly, Bobbie ran her fingers along the seams of each box, checking for tell-tale breaks. Nothing. The seals were all intact, too, each emblazoned with a serial number, and, in smeary letters, a soldier number. Bobbie frowned. It wasn’t Martian. Was it UNN? Was it --

“ _ DRAPER!” _

Bobbie turned toward the sound of her name. Avasarala stood in the doorway to the workshop, clad in a jacket, hair undone, a stricken expression on her face. She stared at Bobbie as though she were a stranger, or not there at all, or--

“Get. Out.”

Bobbie froze. Avasarala’s eyes had regained their sharpness faster than she could have registered, and the older woman was shaking with rage.

“Ma’am, I--”

“Now!”

The word rang out in the still night. 

Bobbie’s training had her up and through the door in moments. She skidded on the gravel before coming to a stop. 

Avasarala walked toward Bobbie, slowly, and Bobbie found herself backing up without meaning to, her hands up, fingers splayed. _ I’m unarmed, I’m unarmed. _ A useless gesture when the weapon leveled at her was pure, unadulterated anger.

“I tell you not to go in that building, and what do you do? What the _fuck do you_ _do_?”

Bobbie could smell the traces of tea  on Avasarala’s breath.

“I-I-I’m sorry, I--”

“Shut your fucking mouth,” Avasarala hissed at her. “I move heaven and Earth to get you here,  _ when no one else would have you _ , I risk  _ everything _ , and you do  _ this? _ ”

The words swam in Bobbie’s head. “I just, I don’t -”

Avasarala was inches from Bobbie, close enough to strike her. “Anything you need, I could have gotten you but instead, you go right to the one place I tell you is off limits. And  _ why _ ? As a grand  _ fuck you?  _ For the sheer fucking pleasure of defying me? Surely even  _ you _ are not that fucking stupid, Roberta Draper. I would have thought that you’d have had the good goddamn sense to leave your fucking Electra complex behind on that shithole planet of yours.  _ Especially _ in your uniquely perilous position.”

Bobbie could scarcely breathe. She forced herself to stand at attention, to take the onslaught on the chin as she’d practiced over and over and over again for the last twelve years of her life, but those words and who was saying them held nearly too much weight to bear.

“What do you want me to do?” Bobbie asked finally, in a shaky whisper.

Avasarala’s lips pursed perfectly, lethally. “I want you to get as far the fuck away from me as possible,” she said.


	10. Get As Far the Fuck Away From Me as Possible

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A reckoning for Chrisjen.

_ Get as far the fuck away from me as possible. _

Deep within her large bedroom, with all the doors to all the various breezeways firmly shut, Chrisjen allowed herself to curl up beside her bed, press her fists into her lower abdomen, and howl.

_ Of all the things to pain her. _ Even as she cried, angrily and noisily and without the slightest hint of decorum, the logical tick of Chrisjen’s brain continued on. Her career had been marked with some of the deadliest and harshest betrayals one could imagine, and she’d sailed through. Chrisjen had bitten ten mouthguards meant for high-g swells clean through with her endless nights of tooth-grinding, sure, but the molded plastic kept well its secrets. 

All the things she’d been called -  _ cunt; bitch; snake in a sari _ \- and called herself, accompanied by the pompous smile she’d perfected decades ago, spoke of her cold heart and even colder blood. Hell, Chrisjen had hired the very man responsible for Charanpal’s death as her personal mole without so much as a blink, knowing he was the only one for the job. 

But there she was, doubled over in anguish, tears streaking down her cheeks and toward her nose, trails of mascara no doubt spidering along with them. Bobbie, the gigantic grinning fool, had nought to do but unwittingly bust her way into Charanpal’s studio to cut the most feared woman in politics to her knees.

_ Why? _

_ Because _ . Chrisjen wiped her eyes with the edge of her bedspread, grimacing at the black smudges she left there. It was the accidental part, that’s what had done it. All of the smarmy politicians and underhanded agents and professional liars had known what they were doing, and so had Chrisjen. She could hold her anger well, then, cherish it, stoke it with the self-righteous understanding that  _ she had been wronged _ , and that it was her superior intelligence that told her so. That anger,  _ that  _ anger was useful.

But Bobbie, Bobbie had just… made a mistake. Not even a tactical error, just… 

_ A mistake. _

And Chrisjen could find no worth in her fury.

… Which, she realized, had been replaced by a certain sort of sadness, the kind that made Chrisjen feel as though she were simply too  _ full _ .

Chrisjen rested her head against the edge of her mattress. Her head ached from crying, one of the many reasons she hated to do it, and so rarely did. She was tired. She was alone. She was… lonely?

_ Fuck _ . 

As soon as Chrisjen had seen the notification hovering above her terminal, she knew. Whatever means Bobbie had used to get into the workshop hadn’t bypassed the security system (nor could it have, as said system was personally installed by UNN IT on the company’s dime), but even before she looked at the holo, Chrisjen knew. Like she’d known the whole time, and maybe she had. But it was anger and adrenaline that had fueled her forward, sent her reeling off to the garage, into the car, and up the winding path.

Where she had eviscerated Bobbie, quickly and neatly, almost without thinking. Chrisjen had seen it all over the girl’s face, playing in real time. Her Martian, eyes widened in panic, hands raised uselessly in surrender. Too shocked to quite feel the cut.

She’d be feeling it now, Chrisjen thought, bitterly. She wasn’t used to this, to  _ remorse.  _ Professional remorse she knew. Conciliation she knew, too. But to strike at the heart of someone like Bobbie? 

Well, she didn’t  _ know _ that many people like Bobbie.

Chrisjen glanced out the window into the darkness, wondering where the young woman was. Sending her a message would be of no use, since Bobbie’s terminal sat on Chrisjen’s desk; in her haste, Bobbie had left it sitting by the storage shelves in Charanpal’s -- in  _ the  _ \-- workshop.

_ If I were Bobbie… _ Chrisjen rose from her crouched position. She was going to wash her face, and then she was going to be Bobbie. Or, fuck it, she’d reverse the order if she damn well fucking wanted to. If she were Bobbie, she would --

Chrisjen laughed, a sharp sound in the empty room. She knew exactly what Bobbie would do.

  
And all  _ she  _ would have to do was wait.


	11. All She Would Have to Do Was Wait

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A resolution, perhaps.

_ All she would have to do was wait. _

High up in the rocks, Bobbie paced.

It was getting cold. Hell, Luna was always cold, at least to Bobbie. She’d been sweating as she ran, from exertion and adrenaline, but that was gone now, replaced by chill and a pressure near her chest, one that could have been from the change in altitude, or how fast she’d been running, or --

_ No. _

Bobbie abandoned pacing in favor of jumping jacks, short ones, in the gray dust. Motion, she had to keep in motion, and just  _ not think  _ beyond the lizard functions of her brain. Not think about Mars. Not think about the Marines, not think about those twelve wasted years, stacked and fallen like dominos. Not think about Avasarala, or how there had been this momentary fear in the back of Bobbie’s head, standing there outside the workshop, that the tiny woman was going to… 

_ What? Do what?  _ It was Avasarala’s eyes that had grabbed at Bobbie. That dark and wild look. It had been far more frightening to Bobbie than the fact that, despite her recent dethroning, Avasarala could likely still have her quietly and efficiently killed. That the Martian stealth tech--

_ No _ , Bobbie thought again. She needed to stay sharp and not keep hurtling toward… toward  _ that space _ in her head. The one that had always been there but opened like a great parting of the planet ( _ like the Ring _ , Bobbie thought, wishing suddenly for the easy politics of the Rocinante and her crew) after her entire team had been killed.  _ Slaughtered,  _ she reminded herself. They’d been  _ slaughtered _ . By their own. 

The idiots at the MMC hospital called  _ that space _ survivor’s guilt - as in “you may experience--.” The droning voice of the military shrink had made Bobbie almost queasy like she hadn’t been in years.  _ Yeah, sure, whatever.  _ It was that, yes, but a tangle far thicker. 

_ No, no, no. _

Bobbie would not think of the fact that she was days, hours,  _ planets _ away from a home she could not conceivably return to, even if she had the means. About how she was a deserter, a traitor, an opportunist, and a thief, dishonorably discharged and subsequently disgraced. About when she’d fucked that pretty, dopey military boy, she’d felt…nothing.  _ Worse _ than nothing - the absence of what should have been there, but without the notion that it was missing in the first place.

She would not think of how her last outpost had vanished - or that it was her own damn fault, either way.

Feet in the dirt, Bobbie kept moving, letting her body carry her where her mind could not.

When her head cleared some (and it did), Bobbie slid slowly to the ground, her back against a boulder. When had she gotten so tired? Her forehead fell to her knees and into a welcomed, safe darkness.

Bobbie sat for a long time, just being quiet. Feeling the rocks. Letting her heart ease off the edge of panic and back toward a beat more practical.  _ There. Better _ . She let a long breath out. The world was a bit more ordered. Broken, but ordered. Time to get sorted, because, like it or not, there was a bare minimum of things Bobbie would need to do before she could… do anything, really. She needed her terminal ( _ stupid, stupid, stupid _ , the voice in her head chattered), her firearm, and medical kit. Which meant…

The house.

At her full six feet, Bobbie could see the Avasarala’ compound from where she stood. She had no idea what time it was, only that it was dark, and that there was one lone light left on in the house - an orange one, in the… (Bobbie ran through the floor plan in her head, estimating)... Living room. And, not a light. The Himilayan salt lamp that was always on. 

If Bobbie was going to make a break for it, the time was now.

She took the run back to the compound slow, in measured paces. Half a klick from the house and she stopped, hands on knees, to consider her entry points. The stupid place seemed to have nary a right angle, all domed and curved and…  _ Bullshit _ , Bobbie thought.  _ Whole damn building is fucking bullshit. Fucking Lunar architecht nonsense. _

Allowing herself this small meanness snapped Bobbie fully to attention. She mapped her path: if that old trellis with no plants on it by the sliding glass doors could hold her, Bobbie would be able to get up to her bedroom window easily. Rich people had no need for window locks - or so she had teased Avasarala, who was far too cavalier about her security for Bobbie’s liking.

_ Well. Not my problem now _ .

The trellis buckled a little under her weight, but Bobbie made it to the right spot - a sloped overhang made of some kind of treacherously slippery composite material. One wrong move and Bobbie would be dry-sledding her way to a broken neck.  _ Thank you, MMC, for excellent sneaker traction _ , Bobbie thought, as she pushed the bedroom window back. It moved, as she suspected it would, without a sound.  _ Wealthy motherfuckers _ . Just a scoot over the sill and a press of her thumb firmly against the alarm pad and--

“I was just beginning to wonder if you’d ever show up.”

Bobbie startled, hands flying instinctively to her mouth to muffle a shout that never came. A light turned on, the low lamp from the nightstand. Seated neatly on the edge of the bed, dressed plainly in pants and a tunic, was Avasarala.

“I didn’t have much of a choice,” Bobbie said when she recovered some. The blood still roared in her ears. 

“I suppose that’s true.” 

All the earlier vitriol was gone from Avasarala’s voice, and she looked… frayed, a little. “Will you sit down with me, Bobbie?”

When Bobbie didn’t answer, Avasarala patted the space next to her for emphasis, leaving a small indentation in the coverlet. “Please.”

Tentatively, Bobbie sat.

“I want to apologize,” Avasarala said slowly, tone low and even, “for those awful things I said to you. They aren’t true, and I didn’t mean them.”

Bobbie felt the dangerous edge of  _ that space _ pushing up against her. “Could have fooled me,” 

“Bobbie.” Avasarala’s hand closed over hers, then tugged. Bobbie felt the motion everywhere, a thousand hands pulling her so very gently. “I need you to look at me. No more of that marine bullshit.”

“Haven’t you heard? I’m not a marine anymore.”

“Bobbie,  _ please _ .”

Being nasty was childish, Bobbie knew, but it kept her on the right side of the precipice she desperately needed not to plunge down. Still, she kept quiet, turning her gaze to Avasarala’s.

“I know I am not known for my… compassion,” Avasarala continued. “And I often forget myself - forget to leave my socio-political maneuvering outside the door.”

_ ‘'Socio-political maneuvering,’ _ Bobbie thought;  _ is that what they’re calling it now?  _ She wanted to say it - oh, she was dying to say it, to let that bit of her run the show for a little, but something told her  _ no _ . 

_ No _ .

Avasarala’s eyes held Bobbie’s. “I chose the worst possible words for the best possible person,” Avasarala said softly. “It was… unconscionable, really.”

“But  _ why? _ ” If she was doomed anyway, Bobbie thought, she might as well ask the question. See if the woman she was seated beside, the one who had earned first her ire and then her trust, had been hanging on at least two crates of Martian stealth tech without so much as a word. “Why tell me the place was a mess beyond repair, when it’s neater than a trainee’s barracks? Why let a perfectly good work area, when you yourself are starting up some sort of… spy enterprise, just sit there? Do you  _ really  _ have  _ that _ much money that you can piss that away and just let it rot, or is there something you’re not saying?”

For a second, Avasarala’s gaze faltered, dropping to where her hand rested on Bobbie’s. When she looked up again, the pain on her face made Bobbie want to split apart where she sat. “It was Charanpal’s workshop,” Avasarala said. “We..  _ I _ … Haven’t touched it since he died.”

_ Oh. _ “Why didn’t you tell me?”

“I shouldn’t have had to.”

At this, Bobbie dropped her chin, staring at the edge of the rug beneath her feet. “I’m sorry,” she said, “I’m so sorry.”

With her free hand, Avasarala guided Bobbie’s head back up. “In this house, apologies require eye contact.”

Bobbie hardly dared to breathe. She could feel the pads of Avasarala’s fingertips against her jaw. Inexplicably, she felt like crying. “I’m so sorry,” she said again.

“I know you are.”

They sat in shared silence for a moment, brown eyes on even darker ones. 

“So now do we, like, hug or something?” Bobbie asked in a shaky voice, when she could stand it no longer. “Or we could do that thing where we spit on our palms and shake hands.”

Avasarala’s expression was one of pure distaste, and Bobbie couldn't help but break into a grin. “That is one of the most disgusting suggestions I have ever heard,” Avasarala said darkly. “ _ Please _ don’t tell me you marines made it routine practice.”

“Don’t worry. We didn’t.”

  
“Good. God only knows the strains of meningitis you would have incubated.” Abruptly, Avasarala got to her feet, then extended a hand to Bobbie. “No, my most treasured idiot Martian, we are _not_ going to entertain the peacemaking rites of boy scouts,” she said. “We are going to behave like the exemplary women we are, and  _ drink _ .”


	12. And Drink

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> After apologies, Earthly delights.

_ And drink. _

Chrisjen chose the champagne flutes, because why the fuck not? Moments of weakness followed by redemption gave her a festive feeling. She rummaged in the oak cupboard for a lemon squeezer, but only turned up a few old nutcrackers no one had used in a dog’s age.

_ Fine, then. No lemon. _

The cupboard shut with its little click. 

In the sitting room, Bobbie had settled herself on the longest part of the sofa, and was scrolling idly through her terminal. Her hair was loose, covering half of her face to reveal only a sliver of profile and her long lashes.

_ Youth is wasted on the young,  _ Chrisjen thought to herself. It didn’t sound nearly as chastising in her head as she’d have liked it to, but oh well. She was soft on her Martian marine; why not admit it?

“Rye,” Chrisjen said, placing the champagne flutes on the glass coffee table in front of Bobbie. “I found some wonderful rye whiskey hiding out, just for us.”

Bobbie looked quizzically at the flutes. “Are those… do we drink out of them?”

_ Ridiculous. _

“Yes,” Chrisjen said, handing Bobbie a mostly-full flute. Raising hers: “Santé!”

“Manuia!” Bobbie said heartily.

“Beg pardon?” 

That silly little shrug, so misplaced on so large a frame. “Something Nan said.”

Chrisjen tipped the flute back gently, letting the rye warm her mouth. Bobbie, heathen that she was, took a giant gulp, swallowed, then grinned ear to ear. “Hoooofa,” she said. “Now  _ that  _ is the good stuff!”

“You best savor it, Draper, or else I won’t let you  _ near _ the 20-year-aged grain alcohol ever again.”

“Fine, fine.” A dismissive wave of the hands. 

As Bobbie took a second, slower sip, Chrisjen wondered - again, for the umpteenth time - what it was that made Bobbie race through everything without stopping to fully enjoy it. So much of what she did was just so goddamn  _ fast,  _ or for the purpose of utility, or both. Even the foods Bobbie liked best, she wolfed down, or - god forbid - ate standing up.

Chrisjen, on the other hand, liked an  _ experience  _ \-  _ experiences _ , plural _.  _ Ones that had her full attention in a thousand different ways. The low notes of a cello; the hint of smoke in creme brûlée crust; the moments right before she let out a cry and crumpled into a lover’s arms.

Had Bobbie ever felt that? Truly?

It was not the first time such a thought had occurred to Chrisjen, but she let herself linger there. Bobbie knew her own body, surely, but as a machine, as a tool, as something to maintain. She put it through workouts, tended its wounds, kept it fed and rested. But if she took pleasure in it, and how, Chrisjen didn’t know.

Bobbie, meanwhile, sipped her drink. “This glass really is funny,” she said, a sweet current in her voice. Chrisjen realized, with some surprise, that the girl was already pleasantly tipsy. Martian alcohol really  _ was  _ weak.

“I’m glad I can amuse you,” Chrisjen said dryly.

“It almost looks like it’s made out of some kind of paper. Out of nothing at all.” Bobbie gazed at the champagne flute until her eyes crossed. “Fuck,” she said, “am I drunk?”

“You tell me.”

Bobbie sighed, and her limbs seemed to go limp along with it. She melted into the couch, a satisfied smile on her face, and Chrisjen knew, then, without a doubt, what Bobbie was capable of feeling.

“I’ve got something to soften the blow,” she said, rising from her spot on the couch. It was wicked, her plan, but only slightly. 

In the kitchen, Chrisjen made quick work of assembling her weapon - a silver-plated tea tray that she filled with small saucers. Onto the saucers went tiny slices of baguette topped with truffle oil; a foursome of dried cherries, pitted dates, Turkish apricots, and shelled pistachios (Chrisjen preferred them shell-on, but didn’t want her Martian blundering into a dental crisis); six Swiss chocolates with different fillings; chilled, shaved prosciutto arranged in ribbons; candied iyokan, ginger, and salted beet chips; and, with a sly grin, fresh raspberries topped in clotted cream.

This Chrisjen whisked into the sitting room with the grace of a queen, setting it in front of Bobbie with a small flourish. Smelling the food, the Martian righted herself, turning from a pile of limbs into the semblance of a woman. A hungry one.

“Ohh-err,” Bobbie said, eyes wide.

“I believe the proper term is ‘thank you.’” Chrisjen took a seat, a little closer to Bobbie this time.

“Thank you,” Bobbie said, reaching to snag a slice of prosciutto. But Chrisjen's intercept was fast, and she batted Bobbie’s hand away.

Bobbie looked hurt, curling her fingers in defense. “Ow,” she said, grumpily. “Whassat for?”

“I want you to take your time, Bobbie. We don’t have anywhere to be. We are off the clock, we are having a drink, and now we are having some food - very  _ good  _ food, I might add. This is not about…” Chrisjen paused. Bobbie’s eyes were glued to her, utterly transfixed. “About  _ completion _ ,” she continued, after a moment. “You’re not checking off a list, Bobbie. This is for  _ enjoyment _ .”

“Ah hah,” Bobbie said reverently. She seemed unaware of her affect, how it had changed. “May I?” she asked, indicating the tray. 

Chrisjen suppressed a laugh, allowing a smile. “You may.”

For the next hour, Chrisjen watched with rapt attention as Bobbie moved slowly, under her instruction, through each item on the tray. Bobbie loved the dried cherries, licking her fingers greedily when they were gone, and the baguette slices with truffle oil, which produced in her a guttural grunt of pleasure. The ginger made her sneeze, a sound which thundered around the sitting room like a small windstorm, but Bobbie ate it anyway, grinning even as her sinuses upended a valley of tears. 

Surprisingly, Bobbie did not like the chocolates - “my tongue feels funny,” was how she described her objection - or the beet chips - “too  _ loud _ ? I don’t know” - but everything else the girl consumed with gusto. It was a pleasure and then some to witness.

The raspberries and cream came last. “This requires assembly,” Chrisjen said, covering the clotted cream with her hand when Bobbie made a move toward it. “Save it ‘til the end.”

And at the end they were. Without a word, Chrisjen took a small silver spoon, twirled it in the cream, and then scooped up a raspberry. “This,” she said to Bobbie, “is one of my favorite things in the entire Sol.”

She waited expectantly, spoon in hand. Bobbie’s brow furrowed, and she looked at Chrisjen questioningly.

“Has no one ever fed you desserts before?  _ Really _ , Bobbie?”

The look on the Martian’s face was priceless. “Is that some Earther thing?” she asked at last.

“Must be. Now open your mouth.”

Bobbie obeyed without retort, and Chrisjen popped the spoon in, delighting as Bobbie drew back with the mouthful, her expression one of pure delight. “Oh,  _ Chrisjen _ ,” she said, closing her eyes. The pitch of her voice and the informality Chrisjen lurch forward ever so slightly, but not quite enough to be noticeable. 

“I thought you might enjoy that,” Chrisjen said.


	13. I Thought You Might Enjoy That

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Bobbie falls, two ways.

_ I thought you might enjoy that. _

The words had not stopped running through Bobbie’s head since Chrisjen had said them, on that night that was at once horrible and then… well,  _ beautiful _ .  _ Beautiful _ , Bobbie had thought then, still dreamily drunk from whatever it was Avasarala - no,  _ Chrisjen _ \- had poured for her.  _ Beautiful. _

After Bobbie and Chrisjen ( _ Chrisjen, Chrisjen, Chrisjen,  _ Bobbie practiced) had called it a night, going their separate ways to their respective corners of the house, the words played over and over and over in Bobbie’s mind as she curled sleeplessly in bed. They pulled at her, but  _ why _ ? There was something in them that Bobbie couldn’t parse -  _ wouldn’t  _ parse, Bobbie admitted to herself - but that she seemed equally unable to ignore. 

_ Those  _ words, from  _ that woman.  _ With her face alight with drink and mischief and…

_ And _ .

(Bobbie imagined gears grinding to a halt, and it made her feel marginally better).

But they kept repeating, still, those same goddamn fucking words - and more not spoken, less clear - like a growing itch. Bobbie sat with them at breakfast, poking at her leftover chicken satay without seeing it, and on into the afternoon when they hurled themselves, wholly unbidden, at her as she scrolled through MRCN documents, Chrisjen just an arm’s length away.

It was making her crazy.

“I’m going for a run,” Bobbie announced, on the third day. She had to clear her head, push the onslaught of unwanted thoughts as far away as possible. Muddled, abstract musings were no good for her - not for her work, her mental acuity, or… 

_ No _ .

Chrisjen eyed her from over her holodisplay. “You didn’t sleep again,” she said flatly.

Bobbie groaned. “Jesus, how do you  _ know? _ ”

Chrisjen lifted her hands and made an elegant shrugging gesture. “Just do,” she said.

“Well, running helps.”

“So would a nap. And decaffeinated coffee.”

“Sacrilege.”

The two looked at each other, hard, for several moments. Bobbie could feel her heartbeat in her ears. 

“A run,” she repeated, uselessly.

“I can’t stop you,” Chrisjen said.

_ But you can _ .

Bobbie took the hill at a good clip, feeling the familiar burn in her lungs.  _ You could get me to do whatever you want, and you know it. You could crown me king. You could have me killed. I am at your goddamn mercy, and now you’re in my head _ .

She ran and ran, listening to her feet hit the ground, the wind whistling past her.  _ The words  _ dove at her like birds, and she ran faster, faster against them, streaking through the gray landscape.  _ I’m winning _ , Bobbie thought,  _ fuck you _ , until her right foot snagged on a pothole and she went flying.

The impact was brutal, a hard slam against the ground. Bits of Lunar rock pressed into Bobbie’s cheek, a thousand little stings, as the last of her air pushed out of her. Her body convulsed in an effort to breathe, coughing, gulping, pulling in dust. Tears sprang to Bobbie’s eyes and suddenly she was crying in earnest, great shuddering sobs against her scraped and bleeding knees. She ducked her head and wailed - at what, she wasn’t sure - as blood trickled down her legs.

A part of Bobbie wanted to stay there like that, crying in rage and fear and  _ what _ , just  _ what _ , but she heaved one last huge breath and stood. Pain shot through her ankle and she swore, clenching her teeth, but it seemed to bear her weight. 

Bobbie expected to find the living room and kitchen empty when she dragged herself through the front door, but Chrisjen was fussing in the fridge, taking out a variety of ingredients.

“I thought we might -  _ oh _ .” She stared at Bobbie in horror, then became a whirl of motion, rushing to where Bobbie stood. “What happened?”

“I’m fine, I’m fine.” Bobbie closed her eyes and drew back from Chrisjen. “I just fell. I need a shower and a medikit and I’m… I’m fine.”

“You’re covered in blood and gravel. Just sit here, and--”

“No.” Bobbie put up her hands. “I just… I… Please, just  _ please _ leave it alone.”

To her surprise, Chrisjen retreated, but the concern never left her face. She nodded at Bobbie and turned from her, back to her kitchen task.

In the shower, Bobbie watched as blood and dirt swirled down the drain. Her entire body hurt, from the scrapes and the impact both, and she hissed in pain as she pulled rice-sized pieces of rock out of her cheek with her fingers. The water burned the wounds -  _ road rash times infinity _ , Bobbie thought, wincing - but she let it beat down on her to soften her skin so that she could roll the rest of the gravel bits out of her hands and knees with the pad of her thumb. 

_ You’re out of shape, soldier _ , Bobbie told herself.  _ This is a little tiny nothing and you’re down for the count. _

When she was done, Bobbie wrapped herself in a towel and field-dressed her scrapes, using a liberal amount of gauze padding to obscure them from view. The med gel would heal them quickly, she knew, but not fast enough. Bobbie fleetingly considered breaking into what little makeup she had, just to cover the edges of the wounds, but no. That was a step too far - and Chrisjen, being Chrisjen, would notice.

Downstairs, Chrisjen was whisking something by hand in a big metal bowl. She looked up at Bobbie with raised eyebrows. “All that running,” she said. “ _ Terrible _ for you.”

Bobbie had to laugh.

“I guess you’re right,” she said.

Chrisjen set the bowl on the counter, and looked down into it for a long moment. Bobbie froze, watching her.

“I know that you are perfectly capable of taking care of yourself, and I fully trust you to do so,” Chrisjen said, still facing the bowl. “But I am going to have to insist that you take the remainder of the day to  _ rest _ .” Her eyes met Bobbie’s on that final word -  _ rest  _ \- and it hit Bobbie almost as hard as her fall. 

_ Another _ word.

_ Goddamnit. _

“I will,” Bobbie said meekly. Just standing there was painful.

“Go to bed,” Chrisjen said softly. She’d resumed her whisking, the sound a comforting little cycle. “I’ve put a heating pad, a mug of tea on a warmer, and red pepper muscle rub on your night table.”

Bobbie mumbled a thank-you. 

She was on the stairs when Chrisjen’s voice floated up to her: “And you’d better use them -  _ or else _ .”


End file.
